Three more families welcomed home!

SBP kicked off the New Year with a big few weeks! We are so excited to have welcomed home three families already this year.

The Crafts evacuated to a shelter in Mississippi with 15 extended family members before Katrina and ended up staying there for more than 8 months. We're so glad they are now home in St. Claude with their 2 children!

Known for going out of their way to help others in need, the Kings are also now home. We were so proud to welcome such a generous family home on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. National Day of Service in recognition of their commitment to their community.

Cynthia Dellevalle is home, too. She does not have to drive from Mississippi to visit her grandchildren now, see her church community, or celebrate beloved New Orleans traditions like Mardi Gras.

Thank you for all that you have done to help us make these days possible for our inspiring homeowners. We're looking forward to many more homecoming celebrations in 2012 thanks to the support of our partners like United Way, our donors, and our dedicated volunteers!
 

A Different Look at What SBP Has Worked On Recently:

The Patrón Tequila Express stops through New Orleans

The Patrón Tequila Express railcar is stopped in New Orleans today! The vintage train car belongs to the owner of Patrón Spirits Company, John Paul DeJoria. It is occasionally used for promotional tours by the company when Patron holds events around the country.


Due to St. Bernard Project’s partnership with Patrón, a couple of SBP staffers were invited to come check out the restored 1926 railcar this afternoon. The Express is parked in the station at Decatur and Esplanade, right in the French Quarter and only a stone’s throw away from the French Market!


You can see the whole New Orleans skyline from the top of the car!

Patrón has been a great sponsor of SBP and our work. They've made generous financial contributions, in-kind donations of product for special events, and held several fundraisers for SBP. In fact, in 2008, Patrón hosted a series of fundraisers across the country aboard the Patrón Tequila Express to raise funds for SBP's rebuilding program.

Thanks Patrón for having us out to the Express today, and we're looking forward to the events Patrón will have in New Orleans in the future!

Progress Update on the Stroder Home Rebuild

James talks with a group of volunteers from
Glover Park Group in early December.

As a native of the Ninth Ward, Jimmy Stroder has spent his entire life in New Orleans. Jimmy chose to raise his five children in the same neighborhood where he grew up. For thirty years, Jimmy worked his way up through the ranks of the Housing Authority of Louisiana.

The house with only framing completed in late November.

Jimmy lived through previous hurricanes and did not to evacuate as Hurricane Katrina approached. As he surveyed the damage at his home after the storm passed, though, Jimmy realized that he could not stay in such a badly damaged home.

The interior of the Stroder home once
insulation was installed in early December.

He walked downtown through flooded streets. He eventually spent three days sleeping outside of the Convention Center before being evacuated to Arkansas. He then spent several years living in Texas. He traveled weekly to New Orleans to supervise construction on a home he purchased, as his first home was too damaged to be rebuilt.

Drywall was installed in mid-December.

Mudding began at the home in late December,
just a few weeks after construction began.

Jimmy worked hard to closely supervise the project, but he fell victim to contractor fraud like many others. Having spent his entire life building homes, he couldn't afford to rebuild his own.

After losing everything to crooked contractors, Jimmy turned to SBP for help rebuilding, and his home is now under construction. These photos show the progress made since construction began in late November. SBP staff and volunteers from Glover Park Group, Immaculata University, the Georgia Tech MBA program, and several other groups have worked very hard to move the construction process along quickly with funding from United Way. We're very excited that Jimmy will be able to return home soon to spend time relaxing with his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren!

 

One last 2011 appeal to help us bring families home

As we move closer to ringing in the New Year this weekend, SBP is looking back at 2011 and working hard to prepare for 2012. We’ve had a great year!

With your support, we’ve expanded programs, boosted our capacity, and started exciting new ventures. By then end of the year, SBP will have rebuilt 420 homes in the New Orleans area. To the right are photos of several of the more than 80 families that were able to return home this year with the help of SBP supporters and volunteers.

The combined efforts of more than 10,000 volunteers helped us rebuild in 2011. And thanks to our partnership with Toyota and our hard-working staff, our re-designed and more efficient construction system will make 2012 a record year.

But despite all our successes, the needs sadly endure in New Orleans. As one of the last remaining rebuilding organizations, we currently have just over 130 clients on our waiting list. They are young, old, veterans, families with children or grandchildren—in short, they are just like you and me.

SBP has a goal for this holiday season: to raise $350,000 to fund building costs for 20 families in 2012. Your support is truly critical and has a direct impact on families still trying to return home six years after the storm. Please consider donating to help us reach our goal!

Thank you for all that you have done

to make our successes possible!

Days of Our Lives Helps Homeowner Go Home for the Holidays

In an incredible partnership over the last year, the cast and crew of Days of Our Lives worked with SBP to fundraise and rebuild homes in New Orleans. The show raised over $20,000 in 2011 to help sponsor the rebuild of Sharon Taylor-Rachal’s home in New Orleans East.

Days cast surprises Sharon in March

Several members of the cast and crew of Days of Our Lives volunteered with SBP in late March 2011 on the home of long-time Certified Nursing Assistant Brenda Harris. They also surprised Patricia Gardner and her family in Gentilly during her Welcome Home celebration by donating furnishings for her entire home. During their trip, they also surprised a grateful and ecstatic Sharon with the news that they would fund the rebuilding of her home (above).

James Scott, Sharon, and Ari Zucker

Just before Christmas, two stars of the show returned to visit the homeowner whose rebuild they funded. After a day spent hanging drywall on another rebuild site, Days stars Ari Zucker and James Scott spent several hours with Sharon and her family and saw the completed home they had helped fund (right). For more on the visit by Ari and James to see Sharon and her home, read this fantastic piece by Mary Rickard of the New Orleans Times Picayune. SBP and Days of Our Lives will collaborate in the coming months to bring home another New Orleans family home in 2012--stay tuned for more details.

Here is a video of Sharon thanking SBP staff, volunteers, and Days of Our Lives for their help in her journey home, which was also facilitated by the United Way. Thank you to all of our supporters for helping us bring more than 75 families home for the holidays in 2011!

A holiday surprise from a group of SBP volunteers...

We hope you're having a lovely holiday season, and we wanted to share a special surprise from a great group of volunteers from Northwestern University:



Thank you to the Asterik A Capella group for volunteering both their time and their voices to SBP! And to all our supporters: you have all been so important to our efforts to bring families home in New Orleans over the past year, and we couldn't do it without you! Happy holidays and a heartfelt thank you from the entire team at SBP!